Mail Products

Standards for addressing on domestic items

  1. An item shall not have more than one delivery address; Provided that nothing in this sub-regulation shall prevent the delivery of an item to another address as may be specified by administrative instructions from time to time.
  2. The address, either handwritten or machine printed, shall contain such elements and, in such order, as given below:
    • Name
    • C/o, D/o, S/o, W/o, H/o
    • Mobile Number (mandatory)
    • House/ Building (including floor)/ Apartment (including floor)
    • Street /Road /Lane
    • Landmark
    • Area / Locality/ Sector
    • Village/ Town/City
    • Post Office
    • District
    • State
    • PIN code/ Postcode
  3. The address of the addressee shall be written in the centre of the front side and address of the sender shall be written on the lower left of the front side of an envelope.
  4. Address of the addressee and the sender should be started from the words “To” and “From”, respectively.
  5. Blank space of minimum 15mm shall be kept from left, bottom and right side of envelope and the address block of addressee shall have minimum gap of 40 mm from top.
  6. Stamps or Frank impressions shall be affixed in maximum area of 74 mm on the upper right corner.
  7. The address of addressee and sender should be positioned parallel to the length of the envelope.
  8. A zone of 10mm around the address block should be free from any printing or writing.
  9. Non-address information such as sender's code, serial or account numbers or other information are not to be generally included in the address of the addressee and if necessary, it should be printed above the first line but never below the last line of the address.
  10. The spacing between the address lines shall be uniform and be more than 1mm and less than 5mm.
  11. The maximum number of characters per line is 40 characters, excluding spaces between words.
  12. An accountable item tendered at a post office for transmission shall not be accepted unless they are addressed to a particular person or firm or institution.
  13. Such items addressed to a particular person or firm, care of post box and the name of the office where the post box is located shall also be accepted, provided they are addressed to persons or firms in whose names the post box stands registered; Provided that in the office of delivery, if it is found that there is no post box in the name of the addressee, or the addressee has ceased to be a renter of a post box, the item shall be returned to the sender.

Mails for defence services personnel

The following particulars shall be furnished in the address in the case of items for the personnel of the defence services, which are to be delivered through the army post offices:

  • No.
  • Rank
  • Name
  • Unit

Such items should be addressed to Care of (C/o) 56 A.P.O. or Care of (C/o) 99 A.P.O.

Exemption in method of addressing of an item in certain cases

Item(s) addressed to such authorities and with specified superscription on the envelope, tendered at a post office, shall be accepted for transmission without the name and complete address of the sender as may be specified by administrative instructions from time to time.